Scenes with female characters in Sayan and Altaii rock art

Petroglyphic art of Sayan and Altai region contains a lot of brilliant scenes involving female characters. «Hieros gamos» scenes (the Bronze Age) are connected with the concepts of securing female fertility, reproduction, family, nature. «Women in labour» (the Bronze Age) are assumed to have been the images of deities-primogenitrices - they reveal striving at strengthening reproductive forces of human community and nature by means of magic. «Latticed shapes» (Eneolithic?) are quite problematic. They are rare in rock art (except for over 90 figures in Kalbak-Tash). One can interpret some couples of «birthing mothers» with neighbouring male phallic figures, or couples depicted as holding each other's hands, as married couples. With the help of some ethnographic drawings one can determine women's social status (e.g. only married adult Khakas women could wear two plates). «Generation pyramids» are «chains» of similar figures, which reflect female creational nature and the concept of endless generations. Female character and an ox / another animal (the Bronze Age). After Ja. Sher, paired combination «woman - ox» can be traced back to Proto-Indo-European mythology. V.D. Kubarev distinguished the scenes with female and goat figures, having related them to primeval beliefs of a goat as a fertility symbol. Female character with serpents could be depicted in many variants: with a serpent held in hands; serpent targeting female genitals. The plot with female character and an archer targeting an arrow at female genital area is close the former one. Connection to the fertility cult and miraculous birth. Plots of ritual character: female character in devotional attitude (the Bronze Age). Female deities: characters with long unfastened hair in Okunevo art. Long hair parted in the middle is connected with archaic concept of the head as a vessel of constructive vital force. In the Middle Ages - Umai, which is not completely correct, as personification of deities in old Turkic cults is not proved. Female characters in ethnic costume and adornments (folk art drawings). Attributing female characters is problematic, as contemporary criteria are not always applicable to them: long hair and plates are also typical of Turkic warriors; «skirts» can be elements of male armour; some head gear can be characteristic of both male and female characters. Their identification against a mass of anthropomorphic characters pertaining to various periods enhances our knowledge of women's position and role in various periods of historic development. Most of the plots listed above were created in the Bronze Age. The Scythian and following periods did not possess such a variety of scenes. Early plots are too «overt» and immodest for a contemporary spectator - they convey universal concepts of male and female creational natures in a realistic manner, which is typical of archaic thinking. Later characters are more «demure» - they wear clothes, adornments, hair style. In most plots, women of childbearing age represent striving at increasing childbearing power, female health, and fertility as a whole.

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